


Love drought

by edourado



Series: Hell's Kitchen Chronicles [5]
Category: Daredevil (TV)
Genre: F/M, Fluff, Max the dog - Freeform, Oneshot, Post Season 2, Romance, edourado, kastle - Freeform, tumblr original
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-05-07
Updated: 2016-05-07
Packaged: 2018-06-06 22:59:19
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,458
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6773746
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/edourado/pseuds/edourado
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Frank Castle stares at Karen Page</p>
            </blockquote>





	Love drought

**Author's Note:**

> Kastle, because, yes, I've been infected, and I'm not fighting it at all. Let it spread.  
> (Back at it again, with the Leomade titles)  
> Original post: http://edourado.tumblr.com/post/143926789468/love-drought

Frank has been doing this thing, where he would look at her while she speaks, normally, but then, when she’s finished with whatever it was she was saying, he would keep looking. Staring. Clenching his jaw, and when she asked “what?” he would raise his brows, so cocky, like he was the one that caught her staring at him and look away with a smile so small she wondered if she was imagining it.

And then they were not so small. And then they even showed some teeth. 

Karen would smile back, even if she didn’t feel like smiling in that particular moment. Frank Castle seemed to have that effect on her.

She never said anything because, well, his main thing was shooting bad guys. That’s how they met, that’s (a little bit) why they bonded, that’s why they fought, that’s why they always made up (usually when he shot someone to save her. It happened more than once). Karen would not assume anything beyond that with him for the sole reason of ‘who the hell knows, with him?’ It’s too complicated.

But he was starting to make her wonder. Take this random night,for example, when he took her to yet another diner, sketchy as ever, but one they kept returning to. That night, they were spying on this congressman. Karen was working on an exposé on him. Her sources were pretty sure he was… “entertaining” some very young girls.

“If he comes out of there with a hooker I’m gonna shoot him.” he said from his spot in front of her.

“I’m not gonna stop you.”

Karen saw him, from the corner of her eye, turn to look at her with that almost smile. Looking at him, she shrugged and picked her mug up, just so she had something to do with her hands and took a sip of her coffee.

The waiter walking by must have seen her grimace over the bitter, bitter taste her companion seemed to prefer.

“Can I get you some sugar, sweetener, or anything?” he asked, stopping in front of their booth.

And oh. He was cute. Dark skin, smiling eyes and broad shoulders, Karen found herself nodding and smiling her thanks.

He walked away and came back with sugar for her.

“There you go. Sir?” he moved the pot of coffee on his hand to Frank, who offered his own mug and stared, but not at her, with his mean face.

“Let me know if you guys need anything else. There’s this pecan pie, very good.”

He said ‘you guys’ but he looked - and smiled a very nice smile - at Karen.

“I’ll have a slice. Thanks.”

“My pleasure.”

When she looked back at Frank, he was frowning at her.

“What?”

“Someone’s got an admirer.”

She rolled her eyes and they went back to looking out the window.

When they left, the waiter who had refreshed her coffee three more times, always making some kind of cute comment, smiled big at her, thanked them and told her “we have that  
pie every Thursday.”

“Shut up”, she told Frank when he raised his brows while holding the door open for her.

After that, he would always bring that waiter up - he was “that punk” now. And he would avoid the diner, with the argument that “it has a weird smell.”

.:.

Another night, a month after she decided she would start staring back at him - because her first impulse was always to hide her face in her hands - they were at his place, which looked more like a weapons factory, and she was petting his dog while he looked for bullets for her gun, when she saw a big one he had been cleaning up.

“Would you teach me how to shoot that?” she pointed at it, and he turned around to look.

“That’s a sniper gun, ma’am.”

“I’m aware.”

“Why’d you wanna learn how to shoot a sniper gun?”

Karen shrugged and resumed her rubbing of the dog’s ear, who whined when she stopped.

“I keep you for company. You never know when it’ll be handy.”

And then he stared again.

Her heart did that thing, but she held his look. And then he chuckled, turning back and getting a box of bullets.

“Ok. Let’s go.”

“What, now?”

“You got something better to do?”

An hour later, they were lying on their stomachs on a hill, shoulders touching, and he was telling her all these technical things about the gun, how the trigger worked, safety, bullets, casing, kick, aim, silencer.

“Where are we, anyway?” she asked when he moved to give her space in front of the weapon he had put together, aiming forward.

“You let me worry about that. Alright. Can you see your target?”

She looked through what she learned was called the aim assist. Her target was a window on the second story of a house.

“There’s no one in this house, right? You’re not gonna make me shoot some pimp, or something?”

“No, that’s lesson 2. Do you have your target or what?”

“Yes, I have it.”

“Ok. Set your aim. Safety off.”

Looking through the aim assist, Karen moved the gun a little bit to center it where she wanted. Taking a second to let the situation sink in: she was lying on a hill, probably ruining her clothes, next to Frank Castle, shooting at an empty house.

Fine by her.

She turned the safety off.

“Whenever you’re ready”, he whispered by her side and she took a steadying breath.

The man’s got a great voice.

Pulling the trigger, her bullet went through the window, breaking a whole in the glass.

Moving her eye away from the aim, Karen smiled, biting her lip, and looked at Frank at her left.

“That’s my girl”, he said and he really should smile more. It lit his whole face up. It made her happy. “Ok, another window. You set the aim this time.”

Karen shot all the windows at her disposal, and then he showed off and shot a few small things, like the mailbox or the peephole on the front door.

“Come on, sniper girl, let’s get some pie or something,” he said, helping her up after showing her how to dismantle the weapon (she did not pay attention).

“Pecan pie?” she teased, certain he would roll his eyes or something.

Frank stared again, this time letting his eyes wander from her eyes to her lips and then back.

“I don’t think so.”

He held her eyes for another few seconds and then looked away towards where they had parked the car. 

“I hate pecan pie.”

.:.

It wasn’t until almost three weeks after that that Karen could stop all that wondering.

Four in the morning and they were walking his dog. She had been hidden in his apartment, weirdly enough, as per Matt’s request. Apparently there were still some ninjas running around and he needed to deal with them and Frank decided he needed to help.

So he locked her in, gave her instructions on how to leave unnoticed if needed and how to shoot someone through the kitchen door in case she heard any strange noises.

She spent almost seven hours surrounded by every kind of weapon she could imagine and when he walked in again, she was trying to teach the dog how to sit on command.

“Hey. Anything happen?”

“You could say that.” he said, closing the door behind him. “We got this guy. Asked him some questions.”

“Oh God. Is he dead?”

He looked at her for a second, as if deciding if he should tell her the truth or not. But he always did.

“Yeah.”

For a moment, she felt bad. But then she remembered how they shot that old man, how they kidnapped all those people, those kids, and how they almost cut that’s man’s foot off. 

And they almost killed Matt. So she took a deep breath and decided she could live with that fact.

“Are you hungry?” Frank asked, so serious Karen would think he was mad at her, if she didn’t know better.

“Yeah, actually.”

“Alright. Let’s get some breakfast or something.”

When he opened the door for her, the dog started whining.

“Shh, it’s ok, I’ll bring you some”, he said, taking a step to walk out and close the door. That only caused the pet to whine harder.

“Why don’t we take him?”

He looked at her and she shrugged, smiling.

Five minutes later, they were walking towards any place that could sell them food at three thirty in the morning, which turned out to be this sandwich food truck.

“What’s his name, anyway?” she asked, after giving the last bite to the dog.

He looked at it, biting on what remained of his second cuban sandwich, thinking.

“I don’t know.”

“What do you call him?”

“Boy.”

She chuckled. “Well. That’s cute, but he needs a real name.”

They stopped, waiting for the right light to cross the street, and Karen thought about the possibilities.

“How about P? You know, for ‘Punisher’?”

He nudged her with his elbow, clicking his tongue disapprovingly.

“Ok, that’s out”.

They kept on walking and she kept on suggesting, he kept on passing names.

Before they turned a corner, he changed the leash he was holding to his other hand and held her own, suddenly serious.

She was about to ask what he was doing when they turned and she saw the thugs he probably heard before her. Five or six, looking drunk, a few beer bottles scattered on the floor by them.

They hinted the intention of walking up to them to do whatever, but Frank is a scary dude. One look and they sat back, stopped talking altogether and the noise only resumed when they walked past them.

“How about Max?” Frank asked when they turned another corner.

She looked at him, offered a small smile and then looked at the pitbull walking ahead of them. It was almost impossible to tell he used to be a fighting dog. He looked very, very sweet. That small missing piece of his ear might as well have been from hard core play time.

“I think it works.”

So when they turned on her corner, they were fed, the dog was named and his hand was still holding hers.

“You watch your back, ok?” Frank told her, and she was starting to really, really like that scruffy quality of his voice.

“Always do.”

“Debatable, but ok.”

She rolled her eyes jokingly and he stared. Again, with the staring and the clenching of the jaw.

“I will.”

He kept staring. Not hard, not invasive at all. Not looking for anything, just… looking, that way he did. Maybe reading.

She liked her lips and pressed them together.

“Ok”, he answered. “Go.”

She took a second to let go of his eyes and then took a step back, turning on her heels and relaxing her fingers, letting go of his hand.

But he pressed them tighter and pulled her back, making her turn around, yanking her towards him and meeting her halfway, lips on hers.

Karen was sure he could hear her heart beating. Her fingers squeezed his hand tight, on reflex, while his mouth sat there on top of hers, pressing, for a few seconds.

When he moved back half an inch, she opened her mouth to suck in a breath.

“W-what are you doing?”

“Checking something.”

This time, his mouth opened over hers, guiding, sure, but not forcing. When Karen parted her lips and angled her head, it was because she felt like that was the best way to…  
Enjoy that sudden kiss of his.

He let go of her hand to pull her to him by her back and she touched his arms, scratching the fabric of his coat with her nails a bit.

“What are you checking?” she asked and he let out what could only be described as a growl, or maybe an aggressive purr, and moved his head in, kissing her again. She felt his tongue on hers and he tasted of strong coffee.

Just when she was really starting to enjoy this, he let go of her. Rose his hand to her face, took another swipe of his tongue against hers, slow, but so intense.

“Go.”

When she looked at him, his breathing was a bit hard, his eyes glued to her mouth and she bit her lower lip, just to see if he would-

Shaking his head once, he breathed in and out quickly, closing his eyes, licking his own lips and Karen smiled.

“Go, go, go”, he urged and she didn’t want to, but she did.

He watched her climb the steps and unlock the door. When she looked back at him, he was staring again, that half smirk in place, almost not there at all, but she was so good at  
spotting it, now. 

Placing her purse on the doorknob to keep it from closing again, she turned around and climbed the steps down again, quickly, before she changed her mind, and his arms opened to catch her when she skipped the last one and this time, oh, this time he really kissed her. One hand around her waist and one on her hair, Max complaining with a huff when Frank pulled on his leash to raise his hand to the waistline of her skirt, inside her coat, hooking fingers there as if he wanted to remove it while Karen ran her own on his face, his hair his neck, down his back, reaching as far as she could and then coming back up and around, pulling on the collar of his shirt while he kissed her hard enough to make her shiver, that hand going lower and lower, pressing on her butt and then coming up and shit, she was seeing spots.

This time, she was the one to let go, because if she didn’t do it now, she would only be able to do it hours later, and it was best not to get ahead of themselves.

“See you later, Frank,” she breathed against his mouth.

“You take care, ma’am”, he squeezed her butt again and she breathed out, and in, calm down.

“Bye, Max.”

Running a hand on the dog’s head, she raised her head again and he was eating her up with his eyes.

“Fuck, just get in.”

Oh, that voice promised so much. And she wanted to collect.

Letting him see her smile, she turned around and forced herself to keep walking, not look back, close the door behind her and climb the stairs towards home, even though sleep was no longer a possibility.

She was wrong. Karen slept like a baby.

**Author's Note:**

> How are the feels?


End file.
